If you’re feeling bad about your unhealthy lifestyle choices, rest assured that you’re not the only one. Chaotic eating habits, bad sleeping patterns, not enough water, and too much drinking, smoking and partying – sounds familiar? Throw in a crappy work/life balance and you’ve got a disaster waiting to happen.
In the new year, give yourself the gift of life improvement. You can make this the year when you stick to your New Year’s resolutions and make better choices. All you need is some help. And as they say, there’s an app for that! 5 apps, in fact. Here are the top 5 apps that can help you pick up healthier habits in the new year!
MealPlan [GooglePlay]
Disordered eating is a real problem with our current lifestyle. It’s not just that we don’t cook at home anymore, because we don’t have time. A lot of people don’t seem to eat full meals anymore, at all.
Finding time to plan, prepare, and cook meals can seem impossible, but perhaps all you need is a bit of organization. That way, maybe next time, you’ll choose to a cook a 10-minute meal instead of ordering take-out or going to McDonald’s.
Believe it or not, apps can help – MealPlan does what it says on the tin: it enables you plan your meals in order to help you make better choices when it comes to nutrition.
This app has a lot of nifty features that will come in handy for meal planning and such. For example, you can pick meals and your grocery list will be automatically created for you. You can also use this app to compile recipes or search for new ones, and then tag them accordingly.
If a weekly meal schedule is what you’re into, you can do that, too! Just drag and drop all your existing meal tags into your schedule and that’s all the planning you need to do. You can even email your schedule to others, if you want to share the meal plan with your partner or entire family.
Sleep Cycle [iTunes]
You’re probably not getting enough sleep. It’s not a hard guess – none of us are. You’re too busy or stressed to go to sleep, and when you do sleep, you’re probably restless and constantly tossing and turning.
If you’re also on an early wake-up schedule, then you’re starting every day with a horrible alarm that aggressively jump-starts your day. And you’re still so tired. If you can’t already tell, that’s an unhealthy cycle to be in. But the good news is that this cycle can be broken with an app.
Sleep Cycle is a great thing to try, because it’s like having a sleep doctor at home, in bed with you. It’s less sketchy than it sounds, we promise. This app monitors your sleep, and it picks up on and tracks your sleep patterns. There’s a lot to be learned from the way you sleep and the quality of your sleep.
Your movements are monitored and analyzed via vibration analysis and sound. That way, it can figure out what sleep phase you’re in (deep sleep or light sleep) and whether you’re dreaming or not.
Based on this data, it determines when is the ideal time for you to wake up. When it is time to get up, your phone will wake you up gently, which can completely change the way you feel when you awaken. Instead of cranky and aggravated, you’ll be rested and content.
Plant Nanny [iTunes]
You know this by now: you should be drinking more water. 8 glasses a day, they say, but it’s more based on your weight and activity level. We’re all aware we should be doing a better job hydrating ourselves. It’s just that remembering to do it and then forcing yourself to chug 8 glasses of…bland-tasting water is not anyone’s idea of a good time.
So, that particular New Year’s resolution falls by the wayside a week into January. But not this year! If you’re committed to making better choices – including upping your water intake – then there are apps that can help you.
There are tons of water drinking apps, but the cutest is Plant Nanny. It does everything, but force your mouth open to pour water down your throat. It sends you regular reminders to drink water and helps you tally up how much water you drink in a day and how much you have to go until you reach your goal.
With every glass of water you drink, your little plant (a representation of you, if you will) grows bigger, stronger, and happier. Neglect to drink water, though, and your plant will fade, dry out, and ultimately literally die of thirst. Take that as a (morbid) warning.
MyQuit Coach [GooglePlay]
Still struggling with that gross smoking habit? It’s time to leave that in 2019, where it belongs. Well, it actually belongs back in the 50s, but when it comes to quitting bad habits, it’s better late than never!
Quitting smoking on your own can be incredibly difficult – any long-time smoker will be able to vouch for that. But maybe if you had a little help from an app, quitting may be an attainable goal in 2020.
MyQuit Coach is an app that is actually approved by a physician. That’s not quite like having the help of a doctor, but it’s better than going into it blindly.
The major benefit with MyQuit Coach is that you can pick the kind of quitting method that appeals to you or is most likely to work for you. You can go cold turkey, if you think you can. Or you can take the other approach and start cutting back on the nicotine gradually.
The app offers the option of tracking both cravings and cigarettes smoked as a means of illustrating progress. There are also other smokers just like you, who are trying to quit and better themselves via the app, so the community aspect can be incredibly helpful when you need support.
Timeneye [GooglePlay]
The biggest issue, when you’re working from home or otherwise struggling to balance work and home life, is splitting your time appropriately. You see, we’re always under the impression that we don’t have enough time, but in reality, all that time is probably going to procrastination: binging on Netflix, watching YouTube, or reading something ridiculous on Reddit.
That means that you’re way less productive than you should be, and that your “work” time bleeds into your “family” time. That’s unbalanced and can easily lead to burn-out. The solution? An app, of course!
Timeneye is, essentially, a tracking app. You get to keep track of everything you do and how much time you spend on each thing, whether it’s work tasks or personal projects. That’s going to give you a clear view of where your time is spent.
It’s especially helpful to show you what the breakdown is between personal time and work time. There is no arguing with graphs showing you exactly how late you worked last night.
In addition, this baby can be linked up to task management apps like Trello, or Asana and even Google Calendar, in order to maximize the efficiency of your tracking.
Conclusion
All in all, self-improvement does not have to be that hard. It’s completely achievable, as long as you really put your mind to it and take steps towards seeking help. The very first step can be something as simple as installing an app.
Nowadays, there are apps for everything, so why not take advantage of that to create a better you in the new year? Allow these 5 apps to help you increase your water intake, plan your meals, quit smoking, sleep better, and even improve your work/life balance.
